> I find that my cognitive abilities (i.e. what I am capable of doing) does not seem to significantly decline
It's very common. Studies on sleep deprivation report that subjects do not feel their cognitive abilities decline. However, measuring cognition using objective tests does show a significant decrease in these abilities.
Seriously. The experiments with oxygen deprivation are very telling on this front. There's literally a button to press before you black out to give you oxygen, and people don't press it. Simple tasks, like identifying playing cards, people fail at, yet are convinced they've correctly identified the card. Our brains are amazing at lying to us.
I think the other part to remember is that the author of the article is 22. I didn't need sleep either when I was his age. I don't mean he's naive, just that a 22-year-old can abuse their body without too many negative consequences. As someone in my late 30s, I definitely feel it when I only get 4 hours of sleep.
That was my first thought as well (I"m in my late 30s too). When I was in college I could pull several all-nighters in a row without feeling too bad, or get 5-6 hours a sleep a night nearly indefinitely without too much trouble.
I don't know what type of drugs you guys were eating in your 20's but if I pulled an all-nighter, I was absolutely ruined the next day and a bit the day after that. Even in my teens.
While consuming no drugs other than caffeine, I was regularly able to work for up to three days without sleep in my early twenties. At 48, I’m much more affected by my sleep schedule. Young people are simply more resilient, some more than others.
To pile on the anecdata: an all-nighter in my 20s was something feasible, even going through the next day (as in, day+night+day feeling fully awake, then resume usual behavior with normal night's sleep, and no further effects); at 25, this became harder, with a crash in the afternoon, at 30, an all-nighter meant sleeping through the next day, and currently just not getting at least 6 hrs of sleep will crash me the next afternoon. sigh
Another anecdote. When I was 19 I did a quick conversion job for a company. I'd take an early train down on a Monday morning, worked about 20 hours a day with just a quick nap each night on the reception sofa, and then a train home of Friday. I did that for two weeks, I was shattered but got through it OK.
Yup. Also in late 30s, and damn. I used to pull off all-nighters no problem in my 20s. Last night, I needed to do some work that didn't get done before, and by 2am, I was falling asleep in front of my keyboard. Ah, naivete of the young. :)
I don't think it's quite the same as self-deception. The way I understood it is that it's more like alcohol: the first thing to go is your ability to judge for yourself whether your judgment is impaired.
I discovered this for myself when I realized that while on 4 hours of sleep, I could power through stuff with the aid of enough caffeine and feel at least marginally productive...
...but I started leaving typos in everything.
That really doesn't sound like much, right? Honestly, though, it genuinely freaked me out a little, existentially, the first time I noticed. I was one of those nerds who got to a state spelling bee as a kid, and I've always been a voracious reader. I've had spell-check turned off since forever because it would inevitably be the spell-check that was wrong about niche terms.
But without enough sleep, all of that competence that I usually just take for granted vanishes. I end up with 'good moerning' and 'how are yoiu' and 'paass the salt', and I don't even notice I'm doing it until I look back at what I've written and double-take.
And that's just with casual writing, probably one of the lowest-overhead mental tasks possible for many people. God only knows what kind of disaster would result from me trying to drive or operate heavy machinery in that state.
I've had a similar experience with artificially masking my energy levels.
I stop reading what I've written and introducing a large number of typos; the grammar becomes weird; etc.
This is why it's important to allow yourself to be exhausted and to notice exhaustion: your little mental model of yourself is incredibly inaccurate. You need to be constantly alert to keep it updated, and if you don't, you will collapse.
Why did you leave out the end of their quote about the metrics they use to judge their perception upon?
"--as judged by things I build and people I interact with."
I mean, I agree that sleep deprivation seems to induce temporary cognitive performance problems, but you're reinforcing a point that the parent seems to already understand -- that self perception is useless without objective performance metrics.
Parent gave their opinion, reinforced by anecdotal evidence that they believe is an objective measure of their performance.
Perhaps what should really be mentioned is that perhaps the metrics by which they are judging their cognitive performance are not as broad a test of those characteristics as one might believe.
I wonder if recognizing your cognitive decline is a cultural issue or something else; it couldn't be more clear that I am unable traverse many layers of abstraction when I havent slept enough; it was also apparent to everyone in my physics undergrad that they couldn't handle statistical mechanics with sleep deprivation.
> Wearing sleep-depravation as a badge-of-honor seems like an American quirk.
Not entirely an American thing, given the the common sight of a salaryman asleep on a train or cafe all over Japan. But given those 2 were the Largest Economies in the World for the last decades, and only recently JP was surpassed by CN in the middle of the last one, it makes sense.
Having done it myself, I think its definitely an experience people should have in their Lifetime outside of University or raising a child it really makes you more empathetic towards other people in difficult situations later on in Life. We on HN may choose startup life for one reason or another, but I know left with a better understanding of the Human condition afterward and come to see that its worth encouraging people who want to strive at something and actually put the work in.
My guess is post-industrial economies require next-level abstraction which is more mentally demanding and hence requires better rest and nutrition. Back when "produce more stuff more efficiently!" was the mantra it was easier to focus on incremental gains. Now the answers aren't so easy.
> My guess is post-industrial economies require next-level abstraction which is more mentally demanding and hence requires better rest and nutrition. Back when "produce more stuff more efficiently!" was the mantra it was easier to focus on incremental gains. Now the answers aren't so easy.
That's overstating the Work culture in either situation, in my opinion; in Japan its typical to have to stay only until the boss leaves, and the drinking culture that follows is mainly to curry favour with the higher-ups to climb the corporate latter. If that counts as 'abstraction' to you, I'm not sure what to make of your 'post industrial' POV.
In the US corporate World, which is the only one I have any experience with, 'playing the game' is often more important than actual skill or merit. Which is why I despised my time within it.
I'm not hired to be your drinking buddy or be a confidant, I'm a hired-gun for your project and only really there to offset my living expenses and bootstrap the more cool and interesting things I do in my Life.
Making work be or seem anything other than 'work' requires a lot of de-compartmentalization for me and encumbering a person to a do so seems hardly 'abstract' to me and the more it becomes remote the better. That isn't to say I don't drink the Kool-aid for the things I'm passionate about, but that is hardly, if ever, found in the Corp World--this is pretty much how I left so disillusioned at IBM, despite being a Thinkpad fanboy.
Sleep deprivation and cognitive ability is studied pretty heavily in aviation. Most airlines have mechanisms for pilots to self report fatigue events, events where because of operational needs the crew ends up working extended hours. There comes a point in the day where the pilots are asked if they’re ok to continue.
It’s amazing that often times in the reports, which are generally done a day later, the pilots will state that they probably shouldn’t have continued. However, in the moment where they made that decision, they didn’t feel all that tired. We ask the pilots to make a critical decision about themselves at precisely the time where they may not have the best judgment.
Yeah, I think I should have been more specific that I'm judging against the things I usually need to complete for work--which do not necessarily take my utmost brilliance. I haven't been rigorously tested on low sleep.
The definitive reference for all things sleep is “why we sleep” by Matthew Walker. It’s a fantastic read, highly recommended. It single handedly moved getting enough sleep from a similar category to “I should probably eat less salt” to “this is the single most important thing for my health” for me.
I recall reading something linked on HN some months ago where someone dissected that book rather brutally, pointing out inaccuracies, flat-out lies, instances of ignoring inconvenient data, and conclusions drawn without any supporting evidence, so... not sure I'd treat that as gospel.
Yes, I saw that following links from this thread, and have spent more of the morning than I should have reading it and the various threads discussing it.
I think the criticism seems valid, and it probably means I shouldn't use the book as a reply to people asking for scientific evidence (like the comment I replied to). That said, I don't think it detracts from the main argument of the book, or the main revelation for me, which is that most people don't realise how damaging lack of sleep is. I would still recommend it to a lay friend on that basis.
>It single handedly moved getting enough sleep from a similar category to “I should probably eat less salt” to “this is the single most important thing for my health” for me.
>That said, I don't think it detracts from the main argument of the book, or the main revelation for me, which is that most people don't realise how damaging lack of sleep is.
I don't get this. You find that the book you believe provides the arguments for the damaging effects of sleep and based on which you dramatically changed your life is bullshit but somehow this fact doesn't detract from its main argument and you are still going to recommend it to your friends?
Well, I wouldn't use the word "bullshit" to describe the book.
Reading (most of) the book caused me to change my priorities from basically "I don't care about how much sleep I get" to "getting enough sleep is an important priority for me". Presumably you would agree that that is a positive effect.
Sure, I have nothing against getting enough sleep but the book's first 10 pages contain so much misinformation and given that Walker outright falsifies the data in the book (https://guzey.com/books/why-we-sleep/#appendix-what-do-you-d...) I would struggle to call it anything other than bullshit.
I dont know any off hand but Mathew Walkers book "Why we sleep" talks about them. Apparently there are more road traffic accidents the day after the clocks change in spring when many people loose an hours sleep.
Immensely frustrating how many people are citing his book in a thread about one of your own blog posts, of all places. I was so glad to see your post about it at the time, and this experiment is an interesting follow up.
"Why We Sleep" is everything wrong with "science" today, and as a person who also isn't a huge fan of sleeping, I'm desperate to understand the real drawbacks to a lack of sleep. That dumpster fire of a book has set back honest research on the subject by years.
Just venting, as I know you agree. Thanks again for your contributions to sanity.
I did not look into his claims about road accidents but given that Walker misrepresents and so much of the research (and sometimes falsifies it) on sleep, I would not be willing to believe such claim simply based on him saying this in the book.
Reminds me of people I’ve encountered who think they’re better at X while on $DRUG. Almost for sure, in my experience with these people, it’s definitely not true, though they’re convinced of it.
People driving while high are especially frustrating, because they’ve convinced themselves that there better drivers.
It depends on the activity, individual, the drug and dosage. There isn’t a generalisation that can be made because there are so many variables.
Take something that requires more mental focus but do not rely on reaction times, like pool, I definitely play better when I’ve been drinking as I get less distracted when going down on a shot and less anxious about my performance. And pool is a small enough table where the negative effects of drinking tend not to overcompensate (unlike snooker where more than 1 pint will hamper my game).
For some activities it’s more about mental focus on that single activity where as driving is about multitasking and reactions. Qualities drugs tend to hamper rather then enhance.
People who think they're right when they're wrong are frustrating for anything. Try talking with conspiracy theorists about the science behind vaccines and COVID-19 these days? I have. I'm apparently a sheep that easily trusts the mainstream media and will probably be first in line to kill myself when vaccines become publicly available, only so that Bill Gates and Anthony Fauci can become richer.
A few beers makes you better at anything hindered by anxiety. For many people, that's playing pool at the bar in front of others. Or speaking a foreign language. Or holding conversation.
I think a beer can help with anxiety. A few beers just results in overconfidence.
I will admit it helps with conversation if you don’t normally talk and you’re around equally drunk people, but a few beers plus a crowd of sober people doesn’t work as well as most people think it does.
I used to be on my local pub's darts league team. When I was first playing, objectively, my best accuracy was after 3-4 pints. A couple years in, my best accuracy was after about a pint and a half. The effect was most noticeable with the "Around the World" game we used for practice, as Around the World forces you to keep throwing the darts at one number until you hit that number. Other games, such as 601, 301, and Cricket give you points for hitting things you're not aiming at, so inaccuracy is more hidden in those games.
I suspect part of it was state-dependent practice. I'd practice throwing darts in a bar, much of the practice was after drinking several pints, so I practised my release timing with alcohol.
I also suspect that part of it was the muscle relaxant effect of a moderate amount of alcohol probably does help improve the consistency of motion in releasing the dart.
I'm actually inclined to disagree here -- I think after a couple of beers it's reasonable to assume someone might be better at pool. Firstly you're both physically and mentally more relaxed and often more confident too so I think it's completely plauisble theres a couple of beers sweet spot for playing pool.
I dunno. I realize Balmer peak is a semi-joke, but I really enjoy bowling and used to go once a week or so with friends. Some days we'd get a pitcher of beer, some times we wouldn't. My third game is reliably better if we bought a pitcher. So who knows! Lots of confounding questions there. (three beers, though, my bowling probably gets much worse reliably)
Better compared to other players at the moment or compared to your sober self? Because it could also just mean you handle alcohol better than friends you play with.
Jokes aside, fully agreed. You just gotta get enough alcohol that your confidence and peacefulness are up (which would cause you to play better), but not to the point where negative effects of alcohol overpower the positive ones. And that's a tricky one to balance.
Lots of people here obviously also think this, but I maintain that they're wrong. Consider what the Wired article you linked actually says:
> In a 1993 study, he found that hand-eye coordination deteriorated immediately after a player's first drink, but balance and accuracy improved at a BAC of 0.02 (beyond that, performance fell off).
A BAC of 0.02 is like, I dunno, less than half a beer? (And even then the article suggests a mixed bag.) I have no trouble believing that very small doses of alcohol could relax the imbiber in a way that's useful. But I suspect most of the people here who think I'm wrong are referring to larger doses not measured in fractions-of-a-single-beer.
And, again, I very much doubt it.
Your ability to do almost anything falls off beyond the 0.02 point mentioned in the article. What's actually on display here is that people are very bad at evaluating how alcohol affects them. None of the claims here would survive unbiased testing.
.02 BAC is about a 12oz beer for the average male. Given that there is a lag between drinking that first beer and having the alcohol absorbed into the bloodstream, I find it entirely plausible that 1.5 pints in could correspond with a pool player's peak performance.
They've already consumed enough alcohol to move past the sweet spot but it isn't yet affecting their performance.
I don't know about pool, but I know I'm better at Tetris and racing sims after 1 or 2 drinks.
When sober, when things don't go well, the stress leads me to trying to take stupid shortcuts (like braking later and later before the corners) that don't work. With a bit of alcohol, it seems there's a bit less stress and I'm better at doing things the right way.
With more alcohol, the negative effects start to dominate. Slower reflexes, too aggressive driving.
With sufficient effort I can focus on driving the right way while sober, which works even better of course.
To be clear: the only racing in real life I do is the occasional karting session, which I do only when sober!
It's very common. Studies on sleep deprivation report that subjects do not feel their cognitive abilities decline. However, measuring cognition using objective tests does show a significant decrease in these abilities.